Fokus MSP Case Study

Streamlining Microsoft 365 Backups: The Fokus MSP & Dropsuite Success Story

Industry

IT Services – Distributor and MSP in Central Europe

Founded

2021

Website

When your customers must retain their data for six, eight or ten years because of government regulations, the best thing you can do for them is to make backup and archiving easy.

Fokus MSP specializes in finding and offering the products that managed service providers (MSPs) need to protect their customers’ data. With a strong footprint in Germany, Austria and Switzerland (DACH region), Fokus offers managed email, managed security, managed services and the software to run it all efficiently and profitably. They cater to MSPs, IT companies transforming themselves into MSPs, and MSPs who want to gain competitive advantage through automation.

That’s how they know that backing up Microsoft 365 workloads can be a tough sell.

The realities that MSPs face

“The business model of the MSP is in our DNA,” says Stefan Steuer, CEO of Fokus. “We know what MSPs and managed security service providers (MSSPs) go through when they are managing their customers’ IT.”

First, there are regulatory factors. “In our region,” says Steuer, “It’s required by law that, as a business partner or enterprise company, you must store or archive business data for six to ten years. That extends to backing up email, where much of that data lives. It’s essential that MSPs offer backup and archiving for email in cloud environments, especially Microsoft 365.”

Then, there are technology factors. Many companies believe that, because their email is in the cloud, they don’t need to back it up. They assume – incorrectly – that Microsoft 365 alone includes sufficient data protection to meet their regulatory and business needs. Microsoft itself recommends using a third-party backup service. So MSPs have to educate their prospects and customers about what Microsoft 365 does and does not include, and explain the value of backup products.

Finally, there are commercial factors. “MSPs buy a backup product from a distributor like Fokus,” says Steuer, “But they have to manage it as part of a complete IT solution, not as a standalone product. Their customers see managed email at only the highest level; within that service, it’s up to the MSP to manage components like Microsoft 365, anti-spam, antivirus, encryption, backup and archiving. But each of those products is totally different from a billing perspective: some are pay-per-use, others bill for a minimum number of users, others renew after a given term. To be profitable, MSPs want all the billing and usage data for each service so that they can maintain or change customer contracts when necessary.”

“As a distributor, the time that it takes us to maintain Dropsuite every month is low because there’s nothing to do. You can restore data for any user whenever needed without investing a lot of time to do it.”

Stefan Steuer

CEO, Fokus MSP

Making it easier and more profitable for MSPs to back up Microsoft 365

With MSP Marketplace, Fokus has developed a platform that enables MSPs to manage IT for their customers using almost two dozen different software services.

“The products in Marketplace enable MSPs to reconcile those regulatory, technology and commercial factors,” says Steuer. “We offer email, network monitoring, multi-tenancy, enterprise resource management, password management and security for the cloud, the local data center and the regional data center. For managed email, MSPs can currently choose Microsoft 365, then Dropsuite for backup and archiving, plus tools for email management and security.”

MSP Marketplace is designed for ease of use and to reduce the time it takes for an MSP to onboard a new customer. In about two minutes, MSPs can assemble a full service offering and make it available immediately. MSPs new to the platform enter their company details and accept a partner agreement. Fokus then automatically creates partner MSP accounts for them with vendors like Microsoft and Dropsuite and issues their credentials. The MSPs make the connection from their customers to the vendor’s tenant in the cloud.

“MSPs who offer Dropsuite have several advantages,” says Steuer. “First, most MSPs and MSSPs offer a backup product for servers and for workstations, but not all of them offer one for Microsoft 365. Next, Dropsuite stands out because it performs not only backup but also archiving. And operationally, we find that Dropsuite is transparent compared to some other backup vendors or email archiving vendors. Dropsuite is not noisy. Other backup solutions pelt you with error messages, alerts and unnecessary status messages. You don’t get those with Dropsuite, because it’s a cloud-to-cloud solution. It’s very easy for MSPs to use and to maintain.”

Finally, Fokus provides billing data in formats that MSPs can use to connect their billing systems to Marketplace, where data from Dropsuite and other products is aggregated. Marketplace lets MSPs align the billing terms of their chosen services so they can maintain and update customer contracts when needed.

“There’s no way around it: users need a backup solution for Microsoft 365 and Dropsuite is a very easy way for an MSP to offer it. It's easier to install and administer than other backup tools.”

Uwe Brenner

CEO, Brenner-IT

Case in point: How Brenner-IT uses Dropsuite

Uwe Brenner is CEO of Brenner-IT, an MSP whose customers include restaurant chains, sports marketing agencies and a Bundesliga professional soccer team. Brenner-IT offers managed services as a complete package, including installation, user management and a full range of IT administration.

“I use Dropsuite through MSP Marketplace to back up Microsoft 365 data for several client companies,” says Brenner. “Some of my customers are 100 percent Microsoft 365, including mail, SharePoint folders, OneDrive and Teams files and chats. To comply with the law, they need to back up all their data and archive their files, so I use Dropsuite for that.”

By connecting to services in Fokus MSP’s Marketplace, Brenner is able to act as his customers’ entire IT department. He has built a complete package with anti-virus, Microsoft 365 backup (Dropsuite), email security, on-/offboarding of users and first- and second-level technical support. He can scale up for companies with as many as 500 users without worrying about resources or capabilities.

“Through the MSP Marketplace portal I can get everything I need whenever I need it in self-service mode,” says Brenner. “With one click in the portal, I can create a new company and connect it to the Microsoft tenant. Three or four clicks later, Dropsuite is installed in the admin user in its tenant, and then it works. I can connect a new customer or order more licenses anytime, without having to wait for Fokus. Once, when I was onboarding a new customer, I needed help with a configuration problem, so I contacted Tech Support at Dropsuite directly. They helped me straighten out the configuration in no time.”

Continued growth and expansion with Scale MSP

With the stability and success of MSP Marketplace, Steuer is expanding Fokus MSP in the DACH region into Scale MSP in DACH, UK, Nordics and Benelux. Using Fokus as a blueprint, the new brand will continue offering the products that MSPs up and down Europe need to provide IT to their customers.

“From our point of view as a distributor,” says Steuer, “Dropsuite has been very easy for us to include in MSP Marketplace. With our evolution into Scale MSP, we look forward to continuing to offer email backup and archiving for Microsoft 365 to even more customers in more regions.”

By Industry

By Product

By Need

For Email Protection

For Website Protection

For Identity Protection

For Accounting Data Protection

Case Study

Iconic IT Case Study

Partners Programs

Partners Resources

Partners

Community Content

On-Demand Content

Awards and Accolades

Latest Article

Cyber Insurance Proactive Security Strategy

Company

Press and Investors

Security and Compliance